My Binders
In English class, we have to write a reflective narrative about some event in our life that left us with some sort of understanding. I'm not quite sure what I want to write about - I already sort of twisted some events around for the first one, but now she wants us to do a second narrative as well, and I'm fresh out of ideas. Well, actually, I know what 'truth' I want to write about, but I have no clue what event should trigger it. The truth that I want to write about is that my happiness is directly proportional to the love I feel at any given point in time. Unfortunately, though, I don't know how to make one event describe this, seeing as I want to discuss how there was that gap in freshman and sophomore year in which I had no friends, really, and how that contrasts between eighth grade and this year, in which I am at my happiest.
Perhaps the easiest way to describe this would be through my binders. In eighth grade, when we were school shopping, I bought an extra binder on a whim for my 'personal stuff'. I don't know exactly what I'd really planned to put in it, but I labelled it and decorated it with a bunch of stickers and pictures I printed off the internet, and I brought it in to school with me. Eventually, that binder did begin to fill. It collected print-outs of silly fanfictions that either I or a friend found, a few things I'd written (but not much - those stayed in notebooks or on the computer), screenshots, inside jokes, and above all, Val's drawings. Every time she drew a picture, I would put it in that binder, and as the year lagged on, the binder grew and grew. That first binder is overflowing with drawings and sketches - and Val has told me that if I ever let her see those drawings, she will burn them all. Ah, well. Anyhow, I remember eighth grade as one of the happiest times of my life. Back then, I felt completely at peace and optimistic for the future to come. I small group of friends who did everything together, and I distinctly remember thinking "'friends' is the most beautiful word in the world."
Freshman and sophmore year had to come along, however. For some reason, I chose not to get a personal binder those years . . . but it didn't really matter so much, considering that all my friends had begun to drift. What would I have done with a personal binder? Fill it with my own stuff? Really, what kind of 'personal binder' is actually filled with personal things? But those years were not fun for me. I was depressed; I kind of just lagged through life, not really caring much about anything. I just was.
Junior year - I was cleaning my room, and I happened across my personal binder from eighth grade. I flipped through it for hours, just fingering all the pages and remembering where everything came from. It was certainly one of the most incredible experiences I'd had. But I resolved to get a new binder. I biked down to Stop and Shop the next day and bought a bright pink binder with a small breast cancer icon in the bottom left corner. Jeff made fun of me for having a pink binder, but hey, there's nothing wrong with supporting the fight against breast cancer. Or being girly for that matter. But I digress. I began to draw. There were three sections to my new personal binder - My stuff, Val's Stuff, and Random. I asked Val to send me more drawings - just scans, even - and I printed out a number of her emails. My new binder began to grow, and I could pull it out at any time and let it fall open to something beautiful, something made by someone I love. I also got better a making binders that year. It wasn't just drawings anymore - anything I saw and liked, anything that was important to me, it went into the binder. My binder from junior year holds a small braided 'ring' that a sweet friend of mine made for me; it has pictures from Anime Boston and ConnectiCon and has the Hetalia trading cards I'm not even sure I want. It has my first doujinshi. My eyes opened to all the beautiful things I could put in my binder, and it filled quickly.
My junior binder retired in September.
My next binder was in my hands within hours of the last one retiring. My new one is decorated with a binder cover I designed myself, a large ghost sticker given to me by Val's little sister, and a number of bishounen pictures that I printed off the netz. This binder has six sections - My Stuff, Savathus' Stuff, Carly's Stuff, Val's Stuff, Katrina's Stuff, and Random. And I want to add more sections - one for Rose, for example, maybe one for Samantha . . . And it is filled with a number of odds and ends. I have a postcard from Russia, a postcard from the Tatry Mountains, sent to me by Savathus when she was on vacation with her now ex-girlfriend (give a moment to celebrate, kthx). I have the wristband from the theme park I went to with Carly - you know, one of those brightly-colored paper things you wear to show you've paid? Yeah, I kept it. I have the ribbon from the birthday gift I received from Carly. I have homemade bookmarks and a tiny Lithuania doll I comissioned.
And life is beautiful. Whenever I am upset, I let the binder fall open onto my lap, and I know exactly what's beautiful about the world again. I remember what I love, and suddenly my heart soars.
I think I know what to write about now.